Market conditions continued to tighten in November with increased sales up against an increasingly constrained supply of listings.
The Toronto Real Estate Board (TREB) released their November Market Report and here are the highlights:
Houses: In the city of Toronto, the average price for a house was $1.4 million, up 4.9% year-over-year
Condo: prices continued to rise up 11.1% year-over-year region wide and 2.8% to date this year
Rents: were also up this year to date 5.6% for a one-bedroom apartment and 4.5% for two-bedroom units. The average one-bedroom leased for $2,210 this year to date, compared to $2,092 last year. A two-bedroom rental went for $2,885 this year, compared to $2,760 in 2018.
Here’s how the new pre-construction condominium performed in Q3 2019:
4,703 new pre-construction condos were sold in the GTA
That’s a year-to-date increase of 21% from the same period of 2018 with 16,873 units.
Urbanation expects the final quarter of 2019 to maintain momentum with strong existing sales combining with new launches which have increased in the past month.
Current trends suggest that 2019 will represent at least the third or fourth best year on record for new condo sales in the GTA.
A record 71,957 units under construction in the GTA in Q3-2019.
So will investors continue to buy pre-construction condominiums in the face of rapid price growth?
This huge increase in prices has kept investors buying as many expect to continue to see strong appreciation.
What is one of the top investing trends in 2019:
MICRO CONDOS!
As prices have steadily increased, prospective buyers continue to look at smaller and smaller units around 300 – 500 SF with lower price points.
The average price per-square-foot for 300 SF units in Toronto in 2018 was $936 PSF, that has risen a whopping 56% to $1,416 PSF in 2019.
As condo prices continue to escalate, investors still feel confident purchasing new units. However their preferences on unit types have changed. The major increase in interest in micro-units is a sign that end-selling prices for new condos are pushing the limits for many investors, and are clearly out of reach for the majority of younger end-users/ first time home buyers in downtown Toronto.
